The Daniel Boone Area School Board voted 5-3 on June 19 to approve the 2017-18 district budget and to increase taxes by a half-mill.
Effective July 1, taxes will increase from 29.70 to 30.2 mills. Property owners will pay $3,020 on every $100,000 of assessed value, an additional $50 a year.
Board members Carol Beitz, Connor Kurtz, and Rich Martino opposed the tax increase. Member Jeff Scott was absent from the meeting.
“Unless there is a need to raise taxes in this year’s budget, why would we?” asked resident David C. Poole, of 443 Hill Road, Douglassville.
“One tax increase builds upon the next. Take a real hard look at the cumulative effect of raising taxes,” he said.
The board did just that as they considered the 2018-19 $2.4 million budget deficit estimated in the district’s five-year budget.
Board member David Rathgeb recommended the half-mill increase after a motion to not raise taxes failed for the lack of a second by another board member.
“The projected five-year budget shows that the fund balance goes negative in three years,” said Rathgeb. “I caution that the current version of that budget has no increase in salaries at all, and no health care increases. It’s unreasonable to assume no increases in the next four years. If we don’t [increase taxes now] we leave them [future board] very little options. Budgets build upon each other.”
Board member Scott Potts said this board is now dealing with the results of previous boards that didn’t raise taxes.
“The district will be okay if we don’t raise taxes tonight,” Beitz said, adding, “It would be irresponsible to raise taxes based on hypotheticals – it’s a five-year plan, not a five year budget. We saw we could balance future years’ budgets.”
She was referring to the board’s consensus at the April 26 budget meeting that a tax increase would not be necessary in the 2017-18 budget.
At that time, she said future options included selling an elementary building, possible rents in an elementary building, a 2017 bond swap that would net $650,000, retirements, staff furloughs, and future assessed value on the Birdsboro Power LLC.
The district received $832,000 from the bond swap, three positions are not being filled from two furloughs and two retirements, but the other possible revenue sources will not occur for the 2017-18 budget.
“When I started here six years ago, we asked for a plan,” said board President Michael D. Wolfe.
“What we’re looking at here is probably 95 percent accurate. We don’t have a spending problem, we have a paying problem.”
“We have a fiduciary responsibility to be sure the district is funded. There is nothing else to outsource, no buyers for the buildings. I don’t see anyone rushing to spend $12 million to buy this building (the cost to renovate the former Amity Primary Center).”
He said the only expenses that could be cut are half-day kindergarten, transportation, and extra-curriculars.
“This five year model is the best thing we have of what the district will look like for at least the next three years.”
In a last-ditch effort to hold taxes at 29.70 mills, Martino asked the board to ask the district’s voters to decide next May at the polls, with a ballot referendum question.
He said voters should decide if programs should be cut or taxes increased.
“Maybe they don’t want additional special education staff, or they want a longer school day,” said Martino, adding, “Those people elected this board. Let them decide.”
